Read a full match report of the Scottish Premier League game between Dundee
United and Celtic at Tannadice on Sunday Dec 4, 2011.

Celtic kept up their revived pursuit of Rangers when Gary Hooper scored his 13th goal of the season – and his 30th in the SPL in his year and a half with Celtic – to see off Dundee United at Tannadice and maintain his team’s run of domestic form, which now extends to five league victories on the bounce. If Neil Lennon’s players went off the boil somewhat after the break, they still has enough in the tank to outdistance a young United side.

Peter Houston, the United manager, decided to keep faith with the players who earned a goalless draw with Motherwell at Fir Park the previous weekend, while Celtic made two changes from the side that lost 1-0 at home to Atletico Madrid in last week’s Europa League tie, with Adam Matthews switching to right back to replace the injured Joe Ledley and Cha Du-Ri filling the Welshman’s berth on the left.

There was a return, too, for Gary Hooper who had dropped to the bench at the Atletico game for tactical reasons. Unexpectedly, a change of match official was forced with Craig Thomson stepping in as referee when Calum Muray, who should have been in charge, was caught in a traffic jam on the M90 after a horsebox overturned.

The air was bitterly cold with the promise of the snow forecast for last night but the contest proceeded in sunshine matched in brightness by the vigour of the teams who produced an absorbing and entertaining first half. Celtic had never failed to score in a league match at Tannadice since the SPL began in 1998 and it took them only 12 minutes to extend the tradition.

United were deployed in a 4-5-1 formation intended to give them an advantage in midfield but Celtic’s fluency was not hindered for long as Georgios Samaras demonstrated with a break from the left that bore him into the box to finish with a rasping angled drive which eluded the straining boot of Hooper as it skimmed just beyond the far post.

The movement of Hooper and his rival for the status of top scorer, Anthony Stokes, was a perpetual difficulty for the United central defence, especially when James Forrest supplemented the Celtic forwards with his typical guile and direct running from midfield. It was just such a circumstance that saw Celtic move in front with a high tempo move that saw Forrest prompt Hooper, whose response was to slip away from Gavin Gunning and finish with a trim low drive across Dudan Pernis and into the far corner of the net.

Forrest should probably have doubled Celtic’s advantage when Stokes put him in for a full blooded drive that was, however, aimed directly at Pernis, who clutched gratefully. United’s response was to switch to 4-4-2 with Johnny Russell pushed up alongside Jon Daly.

It made no difference to United’s outstanding weakness – that their frequently inventive build-up was not transformed into menace where it mattered – and the uncomfortable statistic is that Fraser Forster did not have to make a single save, unlike Pernis, who had to keep his wits about him as Celtic renewed their pressure in the closing minutes of what had otherwise been an anti-climactic second half.

By that time Scott Brown had made his second substitute appearance in the space of four days, having come back from a lengthy spell of injury against Atletico Madrid. Between times the Celtic captain had at last concluded his negotiations over a renewal of contract and had committed himself to the club until the summer of 2015, an event greeted by the travelling support with a celebratory chorus on the midfielder’s appearance.